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Three Is a Crowd: Information and Electoral Coordination in Argentina

Adrián Lucardi et al.

British Journal of Political Science2026https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007123425101191article
ABDC A*
Weight
0.50

Abstract

Successful coordination around a Duvergerian equilibrium requires accurate and consistent information about parties’ expected electoral support. In practice, such information is often unreliable and rarely available at the local level, thus hindering voters’ coordination. In this paper, we leverage Argentina’s Open, Mandatory, and Simultaneous Primary Elections as a large-scale survey of voter preferences. Using data from 135 municipalities in the province of Buenos Aires (2011–23), we show that a narrower margin between the top-two placed parties in the primary increases both turnout and the proportion of positive votes in the general election, while decreasing electoral fragmentation. We further show that the second-placed party in the primary is substantially more likely to win the election than the third-placed one. Also consistent with theory, these effects are more pronounced (a) in concurrent elections; (b) in smaller municipalities; and (c) when the second-placed party is closer to the first-placed one.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007123425101191

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@article{adrián2026,
  title        = {{Three Is a Crowd: Information and Electoral Coordination in Argentina}},
  author       = {Adrián Lucardi et al.},
  journal      = {British Journal of Political Science},
  year         = {2026},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007123425101191},
}

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Three Is a Crowd: Information and Electoral Coordination in Argentina

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Evidence weight

0.50

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20
M · momentum0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.